Lance Stroll says “nothing beats your home race” as the Canadian gears up for racing in front of his home crowd at this weekend’s 2019 Canadian Grand Prix.
Stroll heads home to Montréal on the back of a tough start to 2019. The Racing Point F1 Team driver has yet to progress beyond Q1 during qualifying this year and sits sixteenth in the drivers’ standings. The 20 year-old says he’s gets “huge support” from his home fans however, and will look to right the wrongs of last year’s event, where he retired after a crash on the opening lap.
“Nothing beats your
home race!”
says Stroll. “I was born in Montréal
and grew up there so it’s always a really special week. When I was a kid, the
Canadian Grand Prix was always the race I went to with my Dad. I can remember
being five or six years old and being there when Michael [Schumacher] was
winning. He was a real hero of mine.
“The F1 race is a big deal for Montreal.
You can feel the excitement and buzz in the city all week, and I really enjoy
and feed off that atmosphere. Canadians love F1 and the race has become a
tradition for the city. The whole weekend feels like a festival and I get huge
support from the fans. Seeing the Canadian flags in the grandstands and knowing
that the crowd is behind you feels very special.”
As for the Circuit
Gilles Villeneuve itself, Stroll describes it as a technical challenge, but
a special lap full of memories.
“As a track it’s very technical. You need to be strong on the brakes and set
the car up so that you can ride the kerbs and carry the speed through the
chicanes. The first few corners are a special part of the lap for me because I
would always watch the race from the turn one grandstand as a child. Turn one
has always been quite bumpy and you can carry so much speed into this corner,
but you have to make sure you get the car slowed down and hit the apex of turn
two.
“I’d say the best overtaking opportunity is down the back straight approaching
the final chicane – if you can get in the DRS you have a good chance to make a
move. You have to respect the final chicane too because it can make or break
your lap. There’s a lot of lap time to be found through there and there’s no
room for error.”
